


Dreaming in Metaphors

by Yahtzee



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Alien Sex, F/M, Pugs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-21
Updated: 2009-12-21
Packaged: 2017-10-04 20:56:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yahtzee/pseuds/Yahtzee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Master's paradox machine proves to have been a bad influence on the TARDIS, and the Doctor's sure Martha is the only one who can help him set it to rights.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dreaming in Metaphors

**Author's Note:**

> This is set shortly after the third season ender of New Who, with spoilers for same. Thanks to Rheanna and Counteragent for the betas!

1.

When the Doctor arrived in the year 1502 and opened the TARDIS to see that he was in the center of a discotheque, he realized something was not quite right.

"A-ha," he said, staring down at the pattern of lights flashing beneath his trainers. "This wouldn't be the Renaissance, then."

"What peculiar clothes you wear," said the woman next to him. The Doctor thought that a bit odd – his suit should have attracted no particular derision in the 1970s. But then his vision adjusted to the strobe-shifting darkness and he realized that she was wearing braided hair and a velvet gown slashed to let silk billow through. In short, she – and everyone else in the club – was dressed perfectly for the Italian Renaissance.

Not again, he thought. "Please tell me this is some sort of a theme party."

"It is the opening of Master Leonardo's new club!"

The Doctor followed her pointing finger upward to the neon letters that spelled out: _La Giaconda's._

A Swiss guard, resplendent in multicolored robes, pointed his brass-handled staff at the TARDIS. "Be thou the floor show?"

"Yeah, that's it exactly. I sort of missed my cue, though. Don't let on. Just going to pop back in here for a mo, and when the show starts properly, act surprised, all right?"

A few people smiled at him, but most of them were already dancing again, gyrating about to "Ring My Bell."

The Doctor stepped back inside the TARDIS and locked the door behind him. He closed his eyes and leaned against the wall. Human ears could not have detected the discordance in the humming of the TARDIS' energy, but the Doctor could hear it.

"You're sick, old girl," he said.

The green glow of the engines flickered, as if in answer.

"Can't exactly take you to Gallifrey for a tune-up."

The Doctor wondered if his sad joke sounded as bleak to the TARDIS as it had to him.

Damn that bloody Paradox Machine. They'd been able to destroy it, but it had shared space and time and spirit with the TARDIS for a year. Paradox was a part of the TARDIS now; confusion was woven into the very matrix. The Doctor had first sensed this when the Titanic had so rudely smashed through the wall – with Julius Caesar aboard. On the one hand, he could sort of see it (if you're crossing the Rubicon, might as well travel in style.) On the other hand, it was a sign of how very mixed-up the TARDIS had become.

He'd rested her. Taken her to quiet corners of space and watched nebulae slowly open, flaring purple and crimson like tropical flowers. Parked on the largest asteroid in a belt and caught up on his reading while the TARDIS ran on half-power. Gone to worlds in their earliest stages of evolution and observed as the first lungfishes waddled bravely from the ooze.

Trips like that went well enough. But anything more complicated, and boom. Paradox.

The paradoxes straightened themselves out as soon as the TARDIS left, thank goodness. The time stream wasn't in any danger. However, it meant that the Doctor's existence was now circumscribed. Limited. Trivial.

Useless.

"Right." He clapped his hands together. "We've got to try a different approach. Rest and recuperation haven't done the trick, my best repair efforts are for naught, there's the bonding cure –" The Doctor hesitated, as if in freeze-frame, as he considered the possibility. Then he shook his head. "But that's a miss, isn't it, so that leaves – reorientation. Yes. That's the ticket! Take you to the last place you felt like yourself, reset 'normal,' and then we –"

The smile faded from his face. When the TARDIS had last been herself, it had been when he traveled with Martha Jones.

Martha. The Doctor had missed her more than he would ever have dreamed when she first came aboard, all the more so because of his lingering guilt that he hadn't fully appreciated her while she was with him. At first, he'd been blind to her; during the Year That Wasn't, he'd learned better, but by the time he'd had a chance to say so, he'd lost the right.

They were still friends. Always friends. If he went to her for help – no promises, no assurances, giving Martha nothing he had not before – the Doctor understood that she would do everything she could. If the TARDIS could be healed, and she could be a part of it, then Martha would make it happen.

Then he would take off, alone again. Circumscribed. Limited. Trivial. Useless.

An idea popped into his head. It startled him as few ideas ever had. The entire universe seemed to change shape and color as the idea unfolded in his mind, taking up residence, spreading out, making itself at home. He found the effect quite startling and wondered if this was what it was like for humans when they finally glimpsed the vase hiding between two faces or any other optical illusion that could fool them but not him. Of course, this was rather more astonishing than vase or face.

_No. You've never. You would never. You don't._

Or do you?

The Doctor forced himself to consider it again, turning the concept that way and this, perceiving it from different angles. He thought he was able. But was he willing? He never had been before – for what seemed like good and proper reasons, even now – but the situation had changed.

Whether he liked it or not, he had changed. A Time War will do that to you.

The Doctor so rarely encountered true novelty any longer that it had the power to shock him. More shocking still to discover something new within himself. He wasn't at all sure he liked it, this transformation, or that it was for the best.

Way of the worlds, though. Even a Time Lord is not wholly immune to entropy, or to energy.

Everything seemed to shudder with that slight vibration that marked a division of the dimensions, as though the Doctor could travel freely again.

 

2.

 

"What I wouldn't give for a time machine."

Martha stared at Colin across the table of the hospital cafeteria. "What did you say?"

He pushed at his mashed potatoes with a plastic spoon. "You know. A time machine. Like in the movies, or maybe Harry Potter, that Time-Turner thing? Something that would let me finish my rounds and get some sleep, all in the same week."

"Might not work that way. I mean, you might take off and think, hey, I'll be able to catch up later, but instead you get mixed up in some incredible android invasion from the future and spend a whole year of your life fighting off the bastards. Then you come back, crack open your books and find you hardly know your radius from your ulna."

"What?"

Martha caught herself. "Um, I never read the Harry Potter books."

"Huh." Colin wedged his chin into his hands, as if hoping to fall asleep sitting up. It looked like he might pull it off.

"You need to go to the break room. I just finished a quick nap in there myself."

"Are you claiming not to be tired any more?"

"Nope. But I'm not the one about to dive face-first into my potatoes."

Colin simply shut his eyes. Perhaps he hadn't heard her.

She got rid of her tray and trudged back toward radiology, where she'd be spending the afternoon. Martha loved medicine more, not less, for her time away; her battle to rediscover what she'd learnt had affirmed her commitment to becoming a physician. However, she didn't enjoy sleep deprivation. Who would?

And undoubtedly, sleep deprivation was why she thought she saw an emperor penguin waddling down the hall.

Quickly Martha rubbed her eyes, then opened them again. Penguin still approaching.

They're taller than you think, penguins. About four feet. Hard to miss. Certainly the nurses and orderlies in the corridor all took note of the penguin, and Martha could see the momentary bewilderment in their eyes. Then they would each blink, shake their heads and go about their business. It wasn't that they didn't see the penguin any longer –when a janitor bumped into it he politely excused himself – but they'd somehow forgotten that penguins didn't belong in London hospitals.

_This is weird. This is worse than weird. This is wrong. _

Martha felt it then – the urge to drop everything, run home and call the Doctor. Mightn't this be a sign of danger? If pigs could be aliens, penguins could be too. Or they could be robots. Or robot aliens. Couldn't leave out that possibility.

_No,_ she told herself sternly. _You're simply looking for any excuse to see the Doctor again. It's ridiculous, especially as you've been doing so much better. See if you can't deal with this yourself, and if you can't, call Torchwood. They can handle penguins. Jack will probably make a pass at it. _

That made her smile. Reenergized, Martha walked up to the penguin and asked, "Excuse me, can I help you?"

It tilted its head and blinked its beady eyes.

Feeling a little foolish, Martha nonetheless persisted. "Are you sure this is where you belong?"

"Don't be silly," said the Doctor. "Penguins don't speak English."

Martha lifted her head and saw him, there in his blue suit, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed as if there were no place in the world he felt more at home. She could have laughed out loud. She could have wept. She wasn't at all sure that her sleep deprivation wasn't worse than she thought. "Doctor?"

He smiled. "Doctor," he addressed her in turn, with a respect that made her throat go tight.

First things first. She pointed at the penguin. "Robot alien?"

"Just a penguin out of place. I'm afraid that's my fault."

"What do you mean, your fault?"

"The TARDIS is feeling a wee bit under the weather." He raised one eyebrow. "Do you make house calls?"

**

She left work at 2 a.m. Fortunately, it was a fairly quiet shift – only a few appointments, just one more penguin – so Martha still had a little energy left as she walked out of the hospital, across the car park and toward the TARDIS. Despite the darkness, the TARDIS seemed to glow a bit, as though it were a doorway in reality itself, one she could step through and find herself on the other side of everything she'd known.

More prosaic concerns demanded their due, tough. As her mules clopped upon the asphalt, Martha gave herself a stern talking-to. _This is your chance to prove that you can just be friends. Wouldn't it be nice to have him as a friend? _

You've missed him so much.

Right, then. You help him with the TARDIS and you go straight home.

Despite her resolutions, Martha felt the thrill of it as she opened the TARDIS door again, experienced once more the miracle of the huge, golden inside within that small blue shell. The Doctor stood at the controls, and at the sight of her, his face split into a grin. "Martha Jones!" He leaped toward her and grabbed her in his arms, spinning her around until she laughed. Some of her resolve melted as she hugged him back.

_It's worth it, sometimes, _she told herself. Getting your heart broken. _ It reminds you that you can still feel. _

"You didn't act like this in the hospital," she said, laughing, as he set her down.

"Well, you know. Professional decorum and all that. Besides, wouldn't want to shock the penguins."

"This is yet another of those questions I can't believe I need to ask, but why is the TARDIS making penguins?"

"It isn't making penguins. It's making paradoxes."

Martha sucked in a quick breath. "You mean – the Master's Paradox Machine?"

"Infected the TARDIS. I'm positive she can heal, but I think she needs your help."

"The TARDIS may be organic, but that doesn't mean human medicine is going to apply. Honestly, I don't much see how it could."

"Not your help as a physician. Your help as a friend." The Doctor put one hand on the TARDIS controls, a gesture that reminded Martha of an equestrian soothing a skittish horse. "The here and now is very close to where and when we were the last time the TARDIS behaved like herself. So the paradoxes being created are rather minor. A few penguins, and torrential rain on what ought to have been a dry day. Nothing significant."

Martha hadn't even realized it had rained. She only remembered the brightness of the morning on her way to work, which seemed like a very long time ago. "You mean, sometimes it's worse?"

"The farther we go, the worse it gets. Any complexities of the behavior of intelligent life – well, to use a technical term, the TARDIS makes them go higgledy-piggledy."

"So the timey-wimey's gone wibbly-wobbly?"

"Exactly. I knew you'd understand." The Doctor beamed.

"Then you'll park her here for a while. Get her – recalibrated, or whatever it is."

"A stationary TARDIS is no TARDIS at all. She needs to fly. To explore. But she needs her compass." The Doctor's eyes met hers. "We both do."

"I don't see a compass on the controls. Besides, what's north and south when you're out in space?"

"I was speaking metaphorically."

"You mean – me? Oh." Martha felt flattered, and felt slightly worried about feeling flattered. This was so like one of her fantasies – the Doctor returned, humbled and eager for her company, saying sweet things that revealed how important she really was to him. It would be easy to get swept up in him again. Easy to forget he was essentially bringing the TARDIS in for a tune-up.

The Doctor scuffed one shoe against the floor, like a bashful schoolboy. "I'd have you back in the morning, so far as anybody on the outside would know."

"If the TARDIS works properly, you mean."

"Worked properly enough to get me here," he pointed out. Then the Doctor hesitated, and something about the silence made her cheeks feel warm. "I realize I'm asking a lot."

Her own stupid fault for telling him the full truth when she left. Martha tossed her hair and smiled breezily at him. "Nah. No problem at all. Why not?"

"Good."

"Yeah. It's going to be fun."

"Excellent. Well." The Doctor clapped his hands together and grinned. "Let's head wild blue yonder-wards, shall we?"

3.

Their initial two trips were brief and strange. First he took her to the American Old West, at least some version of it where kangaroos were indigenous to Arizona and the Apache rode Harley-Davidsons. When Martha protested that this clearly wasn't right, the Doctor insisted that they simply needed to give the TARDIS more chances to find its bearings. For that they went back farther, to the eighth century, where they witnessed some Vikings pillaging, albeit from a safe distance.

As they sat together on the hillside watching some thatched roofs burn, Martha offered, "Don't think the Vikings wore hot pink."

"Not so much, no." The Doctor seemed weirdly reassured. "But that's the only oddity, at least so far as I can see."

"For all we know, there could be 40-foot bats attacking Paris this instant."

"I think not." He folded his arms upon his knees and rested his chin there, oddly like Colin trying to nap at work. "This is quite close to history. So what if the Vikings look a tad more - festive? It's much, much closer to the mark than we've been lately."

"That sounds like wishful thinking to me."

"Which one of us is the Time Lord here, hmm?"

She rolled her eyes. "If the TARDIS is getting better, I guess you'd know it. Does that mean I'm headed home now?"

"Not yet." Instead of staring at the Vikings, he focused his attention on her. "Tell me, how are your parents?"

"They're good. Mum and Dad are dating again, you know."

"I had an inkling."

"That year – with the Master –" Could she speak of it? The wounds of that year still felt so raw to her, so fresh; as difficult as it had been for Martha, she knew it had been unfathomably worse for the Doctor. Her parents had been only incidental victims of the Master's sadism during that time, and their stories had made her cry harder than she ever had in her life. Even they said the Doctor had borne the worst of it.

They had also said that his courage gave them courage. Although they had little freedom to speak to the Doctor, and so had not truly become friends, they admired and trusted him completely. From the look in the Doctor's eyes, the feeling was mutual – and hearing about her family was worth revisiting those dark days, for him.

Martha collected herself. "I think that year with the Master changed them for the better, at least as far as the way they treat each other. Dad doesn't take Mum for granted any longer. Mum doesn't always assume the worst about him or anyone. They're even a bit mushy with each other at times."

"Hurrah for mush." The Doctor nudged her elbow with his. "And Tish?"

"She had a harder time of it at first, but she's mending. Got a fabulous new job with one of the big law firms, does their PR. She's started dating a barrister; he's called Geoffrey. He seems nice."

Maddeningly blithe, he continued, "And you? Is there anyone for you?"

"Not currently." That answer made her feel somewhat naked. Martha stared resolutely at the Viking ships, their pink sails unfurling as they prepared to return to sea. "I spent a bit of time with a bloke named Roger. An architect." A fond smile tickled her lips. "A looker, too."

"How very marvelous of Roger." Didn't that sound like jealousy? She had to stop deceiving herself, but oh, the Doctor's scowl. "Not currently, you said."

"He got a place with a firm in Edinburgh. Asked me to go with him. I wasn't ready. So that was that."

"Edinburgh's not so far away in the grand scheme of things."

"It wasn't the distance. It was the commitment." That was as much as she intended to discuss it with the Doctor. "What about you? Had anyone else aboard?"

"No one."

"Suppose you weren't feeling lonely."

His expression was strange – like he was questioning something – but then it softened, as if he'd found the answer. "I didn't say that."

Martha's heart did something deliciously melty that made her feel 14 years old again. Frustrated by her own weakness, she stood up and brushed off her jeans. "Well, improvement or not, the TARDIS is still making paradoxes. I'm not much of a compass."

"I'm telling you, this is a definite improvement. I think she's getting the hang of it again. Let's try something a bit different."

"The future?"

"Another world."

**

Levixtian Three had an apple-green sky and rich blue grass that felt as soft as velvet. Martha wore no shoes; the Doctor had insisted that tradition decreed everyone go barefoot during the Sky Festival. His own trainers discarded, he padded alongside her, grinning madly. "Look at this, would you?"

"It's beautiful." Brilliantly colored flags flapped in the breeze above the billowing muslin tents where hundreds of laughing people gathered. It looked like an ordinary street fair, and yet not ordinary at all, because the delicious scents in the air were no food Martha knew, and the people had purple skin dark and shiny as aubergines beneath their pale gray antlers. "But I wouldn't know what's paradox here and what's not."

"I've been to a couple dozen Sky Festivals over the centuries. Too much fun to miss, really. So far, this looks absolutely perfect."

"We wait here for something to go wrong?"

"We enjoy ourselves. Besides, there's a rather elaborate dance at sunset. The people pride themselves on never getting a step out of place. If they perform the dance as usual, that means the TARDIS is truly settling down."

"And then I'll go home." Martha didn't look at the Doctor to see his reaction. Instead, she smiled and headed into the fair. "They welcome outsiders?"

"Just you watch."

As it happened, the Levixi adored outsiders. They couldn't wait to show Martha a magic trick, or give her a goblet of mead, or weave little red flowers into her hair, or give her more goblets of mead, or play their oddly mournful ballads on twisty, ten-stringed instruments that looked more like wings than harps. Between all of this, they gave her extra goblets of mead.

_I'm drunk, _she thought, laughing as a juggler flipped shimmering hoops into the air. _I'm drunk and I don't care. I can't remember the last time I had this much fun. _

The Doctor wasn't with her, most of the time, but he was always near. They ran into each other once at a stall that sold garments made of the softest, lightest wool Martha had ever felt. "Oh, it's beautiful," she whispered, holding up a jumper the exact cobalt shade of the velvety grass. If only the Levixi weren't two feet taller than most humans! Nothing in the place would fit her.

"You could wear it as a dress, perhaps," the Doctor suggested as he browsed next to her. "Try to start a fashion."

Martha was tempted, but regretfully put the jumper back. "No point in trying to start a fashion when, nine days out of ten, I'm wearing scrubs."

"Well, would you look at that." The Doctor pulled a long muffler from the pile, and not one of the handsomer ones, in Martha's opinion. It was a lot of colors, but mostly brown, and incredibly shaggy. As the Doctor draped it around his neck and examined himself in the stall's octagonal mirror, a curiously unfamiliar expression crept over his face – unearthly, but not unfriendly. "What do you think, Martha?"

"Honestly? It looks like Snuffleupagus got his nose wrapped around your throat."

He laughed, and he was himself again as he tossed the muffler back in the pile. "Best to live in the now. Oooh, look, yet another mead cart. My cup runneth over, in a wholly literal sense."

After that, Martha only glimpsed the Doctor at a distance. She would look up to see him munching on some shish kebab sort of thing or chatting animatedly with the townsfolk. Always, the second after she caught sight of him, he would glance toward her and smile.

At last twilight darkened the sky to the color of pine needles, and all the musicians formed a wide circle in the dark blue meadow. Dozens of Levixi, from children to elders, dashed into the circle, clearly eager to dance. The music started – something with a deep, percussive thump, and the sweet sound of harps, and something sort of like a digideroo. It was bizarre. It was wonderful.

The dance started. At first, Martha thought, it didn't look that complicated; honestly, it wasn't that far off the Electric Slide. Then she realized that there were subtle hand gestures accompanying every move. Although she could not have said how she knew, Martha understood that they were thanking the sky for sheltering them, for sending rain, for bearing aloft the sun.

_This is why I traveled with him, _Martha thought. _Seeing the universe like this. Everything else really was secondary. This was what mattered. I must never forget that, or regret it, either. _

"Amazing, isn't it?" The Doctor murmured into her ear. He'd slipped up behind her while she was enraptured with the dancing.

"Yeah. I can see why you keep coming back here. Are they doing it properly?"

"Every step, every beat."

Martha grinned. "You were right. The TARDIS is definitely getting the hang of it."

"That calls for a celebration, don't you think?" His eyes sparkled. "Do you want to dance?"

"Oh, no. I couldn't. I'd get the steps wrong and mess it up for them."

"Outside the circle, I meant." His hand closed around hers. "Come on."

She let him lead her away from the fair, into the dusk-shadowed grassland. The TARDIS stood nearby, bearing silent witness. Martha giggled as the Doctor spun her around – not really dancing, only spinning – and the percussion of the drums seemed to thump along with her heartbeat.

"We should stop," she said. No point in getting carried away. Not that the Doctor would, but Martha wanted to keep her feet on the ground.

"Not while there's music." The Doctor grabbed her hand, stuck their arms out and began leading her in a comic tango that only made her laugh harder. She tried to tell herself it was all right – just being silly. Surely she was sensible enough to be silly, and not get confused about it.

The Doctor missed a step in their dance, and Martha meant to tease him, but then she felt something cold sparkle upon her cheek. "What the –"

From the fair, they heard cries of astonishment and wonder. Martha gaped upward as the evergreen sky clouded into a sudden fall of snow.

"Can't be," Martha said. "It feels like summertime!"

"We're not quite done with paradoxes yet, it seems." The Doctor sounded less disappointed about that than she would have thought.

Martha remained motionless, taking in the beauty of it. One of the Doctor's hands still clasped hers; the other rested on the small of her back. "Look how lovely," she murmured. "The snowflakes on the blue grass."

"You should see them in your hair, with the red flowers." He blinked, as if about to change the subject, but then he went very still. Martha realized she was holding her breath as he let go of her hand and reached up to stroke her cheek. His thumb brushed along her cheekbone, alongside her nose, over her lips. It was as if he had never touched a human before and wanted to know what how it felt.

"Stop," Martha said. Her throat was tight. "This isn't fair."

"I haven't done this in a while." His gaze seemed to go right through her, but his fingertips were still mapping the lines of her face. "I mean, I remember all the mechanics and then some, but the mood of the thing – it's tricky, don't you find?"

"What are you talking about? Dancing?"

He considered that for a second. "Works as a metaphor."

"I don't know what you're on about." Martha turned her face from him, but he caught her under the chin and brought her back.

The Doctor looked as if he were going to kiss her, and that was simply mad because he had made things clear about where they stood, but then he did. He kissed her. The softest brush of the lips, then again, so gentle that Martha wasn't entirely sure it was real.

Then the Doctor kissed her once more, harder, both their lips parted just slightly. He made a small hungry sound in the back of his throat that started her trembling.

He brought her closer and rested his forehead against hers. Their lips didn't quite touch. "That seems about right," he whispered. "Anyway, I liked it."

Martha had wished for this moment too long to trust it. "You can't be for real."

"Didn't that suit you?" The Doctor smiled, and it was unlike any other smile she'd ever seen on his face – intent, hopeful, totally and completely there. The air around them sparkled with snowflakes. "Show me what you want, Martha. Just show me."

Anger and mead made her bold. Martha took his face in her hands and kissed him, once, twice, again, too many times to ever count, deep and shallow, swift and slow, her fingers in his hair or against his chest or pressed against his back. To her astonishment, the Doctor was just as eager, even more so, responding to her more passionately than she had ever dreamed he might.

_It's the drink. I'm hallucinating. Something like that. _ But it kept happening. He didn't pull away. She didn't wake up. They went on and on.

The Doctor broke away from the kiss so suddenly it startled her. For one seasick moment Martha believed he was going to say they'd made a mistake. Instead he wrapped his hand around hers and tugged her toward the TARDIS. "Come on."

"Doctor, wait. I'm confused."

"Really? I took you for a woman of the world."

"You mean – you honestly – you and me, tonight?"

His face fell, and he stood in the snow a moment, forlorn and confused. Martha knew the expression; it was the one she used to wear when he turned away from her.

The Doctor quietly said, "If you don't want this any longer – I'd understand."

Martha Jones was a very smart girl in any number of ways. Her degree in medicine was emblazoned with the words honors first class. No newspaper sudoku had ever bested her. She paid off her credit cards in full every month, never talked about politics at a party and read the kinds of books most people only pretend to have read. "The Sixth Sense"? Martha caught the twist at the very beginning. Smart.

But she was smart enough to know that there's a time to be smart and a time to be foolish. When the man you've wanted more than any other shows up hot, bothered and ready to go on the very last occasion you're ever likely to see him, it's time to be foolish.

"I want this." Martha squeezed his fingers, and together they ran.

She made him chase her to her room, but there she let him catch her. The Doctor spun Martha around as he had when she'd returned to the ship – except that this time he ended by pushing her against the wall and kissing her for a very long time.

When their mouths parted, he whispered, "Kissing. How could I forget how marvelous kissing is?" The Doctor grinned as Marta planted soft kisses on his cheeks. "One kiss – it's nice, better than nice sometimes, but you have to keep going with it to get the full effect – the real – the incredible – oh, I think we're about there now."

"Don't talk about it." Martha tugged his necktie loose and his collar open. Her fingertips brushed against his Adam's apple, the hollow of his throat and the place at the top of his chest where she could feel both pulses at once. They were each racing. "Do it."

The Doctor obeyed. His warm mouth enclosed hers, brushed her chin, nuzzled her neck. The tip of his tongue stroked her cheek, oh God, he was licking her but it felt amazing. Martha kept tugging at his clothes, finally getting that damnable oxford shirt off. He had wiry arms, and his skin was ghostly pale. She wondered when he'd last stood in the sun.

He took hold of her jumper and tugged it up over her head; the reality of it all hit her as she shrugged off her bra, feeling more exposed in front of a lover than she had since she was a teenager. That uncertainty faded as she saw him staring at her in wonder. "Bodies. Bodies are amazing," he whispered. Martha shivered as he stroked her reverently, his fingers drawing a line between her breasts. "I ought to warn you."

Yes, yes, it didn't mean anything, one night only, Martha knew that and she didn't care. "I don't need warning."

His thumb circled her navel. "Well, it's different, you know. From how it would be with a human."

"Oh. _Oh. _ I'd wondered about that." As soon as the words were out, she felt ridiculous.

The Doctor saw her embarrassment and smiled as he shook his head. "Curiosity is a virtue, Martha Jones." His hand finally dipped between her legs, and it was difficult to keep talking. Still, there were some surprises Martha preferred to be prepared for.

"Your physiology – the two hearts –" she gasped, "-- what else is different?"

"Not the bodies. At least not in any way you can see. But when we're close –" His eyes met hers, and his breath was soft upon her cheek. "When I'm inside you –"

_This is really happening. _

They kissed again, slow and hot.

When they broke apart, she was shaking, and the Doctor was breathing hard. "At that point, there's sort of an energy transfer thing, you'll know it when you feel it, I promise it won't hurt you, but – you're ready?"

"For anything."

After that they spoke no more. It wasn't so different, despite the Doctor's warnings – it was sex, good sex, but nothing alien. A bit vanilla, really, though in the best possible way. And it wasn't frightening at all. Martha felt somehow that it was strange to see him naked for the first time, his body hard for her and yet so vulnerable. To see him as a man – more than a man and yet still a man all the same.

But when he touched her, the strangeness faded away. Then there was nothing but the feel of him, the scent of his skin, the ragged, desperate sound of his breathing and hers.

If she didn't know better, she would have sworn he hadn't had sex in ages. At times, the way he touched her was almost uncertain – not that he didn't know what to do, because he definitely did, but it was as if the memories were only just coming to him in that instant. He seemed to be reacquainting himself with every inch of the female body, both by feel and by taste. The pleasure he took in it, the abandon with which he responded to her every move, made Martha feel as if she were the first water he'd drunk after a long exile in the desert. And he was drinking her in, drinking her up.

When he rolled her onto her back, Martha drew up her legs, urging him on. The Doctor kissed her again – as gently as he had the very first time – then pushed inside. Martha closed her eyes, reveling in the feel of him.

Warmth welled up inside her, a kind of heat that was unlike anything she'd ever known. Martha's eyes flew open to see the Doctor looking down at her. He clasped one of her hands in his as he braced his other arm beneath her neck. They were moving together – slow and good, and Martha wanted that, but the warmth was unfolding inside her, outward and outward, beyond anything she could imagine. Somehow she thought of the TARDIS. Larger on the inside.

"It's all right," the Doctor murmured. "Hold on to me."

Martha squeezed his hand. He thrust more deeply into her, and she gasped. She'd felt that – not just him entering her, but what it had been like for him, too, to be surrounded by the heat and tightness of her body. As she watched the Doctor, his mouth opening in an O of wonder, she realized he'd experienced her sensations too.

She breathed, "Energy transfer?"

"Uh-huh."

Then they were moving together as one, Martha knowing what he wanted because she felt his longing, the Doctor responding to her needs almost before she knew them herself. His pleasure kept redoubling inside her – what her body felt, what his body felt, his delight in knowing her, her delight in knowing him as reflected back at her, on and on, a hall of mirrors that never ended. Martha almost couldn't breathe – she only existed as pleasure now, his and hers.

She came so hard that it was like flying, the most intense sensation she thought she'd ever feel, until ten seconds later, when it was reflected back at her through the Doctor and echoed with his own climax, stronger again, and again, and –

"Martha?"

"What? I – oh." She blinked and looked up at the Doctor. He lay next to her, panting for breath and looking worried. "Did I black out?"

"Not really, but –"

"I'm okay." Martha kissed him deeply.

The Doctor embraced her. Their skin was sweaty and slick, and his chest rose and fell swiftly beneath her hands.

One night only, she reminded herself. Sometimes one night was worth it.

4.

After much deliberation, the Doctor shook Martha's shoulder to wake her up.

She frowned in her sleep and turned her face toward the pillow. Her frown wrinkled her nose, which was really very cute. The Doctor smiled and shook again. "Martha?"

Her eyes opened. For a few seconds she stared at him as if she didn't quite believe he was really there. Then she blinked. "Yeah?"

"See, I was going to bring you breakfast in bed, because it seemed like the sort of thing to do, but then it hit me, I don't have the slightest idea what you eat for breakfast in the mornings. I mean, back in 1969 it was all scrambled eggs, but we couldn't afford anything else, could we? Plus we were dead tired of them by the end. Put me right off eggs for a while, and you too, as I recall. And in the TARDIS you were always up before me. All those early calls at the hospital, I suppose. So I never saw what you had for breakfast. Tell me now, and I'll get it for you."

"Really?"

"The TARDIS kitchen can serve up almost anything, you know. Or didn't you realize that? Don't tell me you've been stuck with scrambled eggs all this time."

"I meant –" Martha shook her head. "Never mind. I think I'd like waffles. And orange juice. And coffee."

"I remember how you like your coffee." He was proud of having noticed this. "Milk, no sugar."

"Right."

The Doctor kissed her soundly, then padded off to the kitchen in the Edwardian brocade robe the TARDIS had obligingly provided from the closet of the Companions' room. He went through the control room on his way and noted the vivid green glow of the TARDIS console. Healthy. Strong. As it should be.

Double waffles, double orange juice, two coffees and stackable trays: all easy enough to maneuver back to the bedroom. Martha had slipped into her own robe while he was gone, which was vaguely disappointing but could be remedied later. She seemed almost surprised that he'd returned. "Is all that for me?"

"No, I've greedily brought some for myself. Hang on." He settled the stacked trays over Martha's lap, then hurried around to slip into the other side of the bed. Then he took the top tray for himself, distributed the plates and glasses and had them settled in a jiff. "There," he said with satisfaction. "That's more like it."

Martha ate quietly, which the Doctor decided was only natural. Rude, to talk when you're eating. Besides, these waffles really were outstanding. Nothing paradoxical about the food, definitely. But her eyes kept stealing over to him, almost suspicious, as if she thought he might try to snatch her fork.

Then Martha said, "Is this because – because you feel guilty?"

"Breakfast? It's because I feel hungry."

"No. Last night." Martha stared down at her plate. "Did you just, I don't know, feel sorry for me, and thought maybe once you'd show me a good time? That I deserved it or something like that?"

"Absolutely not. Martha, the last thing I'd ever feel for you, ever, is pity."

"Then why is this happening? Because you don't love me. You were clear enough about that, and I was clear about – about how I felt. But not only did we, well, you know – but now you're acting like my boyfriend, so at the moment I'm extremely mixed up."

The Doctor set his fork down and considered how best to answer. He meant to tell the truth, but it was a complicated truth to tell. "The TARDIS was sick. I realized that the ship needed you."

"So, what, you seduced me so I'd make your ship run properly again? You know, that actually makes sense." Martha pulled the neck of the robe closed, and her lips pressed together.

"Martha, hear me out." The Doctor sounded stern even to his own ears, but it would have to do. "I knew that the ship needed you, but -- it wouldn't have been fair to ask you to come back unless I could offer you more than I had before."

"I'm not hearing the difference between that and the seduction theory."

"Bloody hell, you're defensive."

"I come by it honestly."

"I suppose you do." He searched for words. "Martha, that year that never happened – the year that you saved the world – I was powerless. A captive. I knew that I had taken all of humanity with me in my downfall. Only the Time War was worse. Only that in all my years."

Martha looked back at him. Her expression was still wary, but she was listening.

"It would have been so easy to give in to despair. But I couldn't. Not while I knew you were out there. That whole year, you were what kept me going. I was counting on you, and you came through – oh, you came through times a thousand. The day you left, you told a story about your friend – you remember? – your friend and the flatmate who never even saw her. But when you saved us all – Martha, I saw you."

At first Martha's only response to this was to blink quickly. Then, her voice hoarse, she said, "If you felt like that, why did you let me leave?"

"It was what you needed at the time. Wasn't it?"

"Yeah. It was. But you weren't only thinking of me. Face it, Doctor, you never are."

She was never more dear to him than when she completely had his number. He sighed. "I've been alone for a very long time now."

"Since Rose, you mean."

Rose's name still had the power to cut him, but the Doctor didn't let it show. "Rose and I were never lovers."

"Rubbish."

"Ask Jack if you don't believe me." The Doctor leaned his head back against the wall, tired of memories. "I loved her. I knew that even then. But I wouldn't – well. I wouldn't."

"That's why you clung to her so tightly," Martha murmured. "She was lost to you forever. That made her safe. You couldn't lose her again."

Yes, she had his number but good. But enough of sad memories; better by far to make plans. "So how are we going to do this?"

"I – I hadn't ever thought –" She took a deep breath, and he saw the shift in her as her mind started applying itself to the issue at hand. That was when Martha looked the most herself, in his opinion. "I don't want to leave my medical training for so long again. I'm making an exception now because the TARDIS needs to be set to rights, but I'm not going away for a long time like I did last time. That's all there is to it." Martha watched him, clearly waiting for him to object. The Doctor said nothing. After a few long seconds, she added, more quietly, "Could you, well, come see me sometimes? Like, make dates?"

The Doctor considered this. He'd never contemplated such a thing before, which was actually rather peculiar, as he had a time machine and all. "I could be there on your days off. We could turn them into long weekends so you could go on some adventures. Make love for hours. Catch up on your sleep, if you want. All of the above. Just as you like."

Her eyes lit up. "You really mean it, don't you? You really do."

"Really." All at once he realized what he was supposed to have said at the very beginning. Better late than never. "I love you, Martha."

She made a sound that was part laugh, part sob and the tiniest bit embarrassing, but endearing as well. "I love you too."

_There_, the Doctor thought. _Wasn't so hard, was it? _

5.

Contrary to popular belief, a Time Lord has a very healthy libido.

However, unlike the males of approximately 99.74 percent of all cataloged species, Time Lords are also able to completely control their sexual drives. It's a necessity, given the travels they undertake and the problems they can encounter along the way. If you get trapped in a singularity for 300 years – oh, it can happen – you've really got enough trouble to be getting on with, and there's no point in dealing with enormous sexual frustration on top of that. A Time Lord can essentially shut down his desire at will. It's as simple and absolute as flipping a light switch.

(Time Ladies were equally adept at self-control – more so, some claimed – but there are no more Time Ladies, not after the war.)

The Doctor had long preferred to remain in "off" mode, so to speak. Simplified things all around. Of course, closing himself away sexually didn't mean closing himself away romantically; he understood the difference between sex and romance better than any hormone-enslaved human ever could. He had fallen in love with some of his Companions, over the years: Jo, Sarah Jane, Rose. In a very real sense, he was in love with them still. But he had never touched any of them as a lover, never wanted to, never wanted to want to.

For Martha, he'd flipped the switch back on. And it turned out that an enormous amount of conserved energy was more than ready to go from potential to kinetic.

"Doctor, you can't," she whispered into his ear.

"No one's looking at our barge."

"I mean – you can't possibly – again, so soon –?"

"Wait and see."

Martha's kohl-lined eyes closed in satisfaction as his hands cupped her breasts. Her eyelids glittered with vivid turquoise powder, and her enormous golden earrings shone in the Egyptian sun. The orange silk canopy overhead provided what little privacy they had, though the Doctor rather thought that if Queen Cleopatra saw what they were up to, she would wholeheartedly approve.

The Pyramids, in the distance, were enormous stone cubes. Not so far off reality that he had to worry about it. He could concentrate on Martha. God, fantastic things, these Egyptian robes, so soft and thin that you could see right through them.

How had he forgotten how fantastic breasts could be? What he was doing felt good to Martha, to judge by her quickening breath, but it felt good for him too, a kind of touching that was as exciting as being touched, which practically defied the law of physics, but there you go.

"Doctor – oh."

"Yes."

Even better were thighs. Particularly Martha's. The warmth of bare flesh beneath fingertips, the subtle friction of his fingerprints against her skin – astonishing.

They lay on their sides, face to face, and he pulled her thigh over his hip so that he could make love to her right there. Martha's hand tightened on his shoulder, and her head lolled back so that the braids of her wig fell across the thick cushions beneath their bodies. Sensation welled up between them, rich and multidimensional and complex. Mesmerizing. Ah, that was it.

As her consciousness flowed into him, the Doctor pushed deeper – delving into the most fascinating, pleasurable, perfect part of a human being: the mind.

_Five years old, standing in Westminster Abbey for the first time, staring up at the great vaulted ceiling in awe. _

Dancing in a nightclub during university, wearing a minidress that made her look dead sexy, noticing that the guy she fancied was noticing her right back.

Delivering a baby for the first time, holding the tiny squalling boy up for his parents to see and feeling their love for their son as though it passed right through her.

"You're thinking my thoughts," Martha gasped. "How are you –"

"Shhhh."

"Let me in. Let me in too."

Oh, he didn't like the idea of that at all. Or did he? Martha wanted it so badly, and he couldn't tell where her wanting left off and his began, not when they were like this.

She writhed against him, momentarily bringing the Doctor back to the realm of the physical, and it was very tempting to stay right there. This felt simply amazing, and what in the worlds had been so brilliant about celibacy anyway? Not likely to make that mistake again.

"Let me in," she whispered again.

The Doctor shut his eyes in surrender.

_Standing on the surface of Callisto Prime, looking up at a night sky aglow with four moons, new and full, waxing and waning, unspeakably beautiful. _

Laughing out loud as the nanogenes cured everyone, the gas masks dropped away, a little boy put his arms around his mother and once, just once, everybody lived.

Running through the cinnamon grasslands of Gallifrey, still a boy, chasing after the best friend who was almost his brother and had not yet chosen the name Master.

Standing in a hospital corridor, watching Martha politely address a penguin, and knowing what happened next.

The Doctor realized he wasn't alone any longer. Martha's spirit was his spirit, her body his body, her excitement his excitement – "Oh, yes."

"Doctor!"

This time Martha didn't faint. She was getting much better at that.

For a long time afterward, the Doctor held her as they lay in their nest of cushions. The soothing Nile breeze ruffled his hair, and he could hear the far-off splash of a crocodile taking to the waters for a meal. It seemed to him that there was nothing else to want, save the TARDIS' full recovery, but surely that was well on its way. Yet the moment was not perfect; Martha was too tense as she lay in his arms.

Finally, once it seemed ridiculous to pretend he hadn't noticed, he propped up on one arm. "What's wrong?"

Martha's beaded collar jangled as she sat upright. "I was there in the hospital when you came back for me."

"Penguins -- they're taller than you think, aren't they?"

"When you came back, you didn't know for certain whether you loved me," she said. "You still didn't know."

"I know now."

"That's not the point."

"Isn't it?"

Martha hesitated, clearly wishing she could drop the subject and sink back into his arms. But she didn't. "You took a big gamble with my heart."

The Doctor shrugged. "I won."

She rose, readjusted her robes and walked to the stern of the barge, where she sat on a footstool and stared resolutely at the water. Going after her would obviously be a bad idea. Instead the Doctor sat with his hands on his knees and looked at the cube-shaped Pyramids, still gleaming white and smooth, so soon after their construction. _Must have been murder getting those top stones into place_, he thought. _Terrible for the slaves. Who'd ever think of the real Pyramids as easier?_

The silence between them stretched through their return to the TARDIS, when she went to her own room and did not emerge. Although the Doctor now spent rather more time in her quarters than his, he respected the boundary and remained at the controls. If Ancient Egypt was still off, then maybe he ought to try something simpler. Something older. Pre-human, perhaps – scarcely his favorite era in Earth's history, but fascinating all the same.

Also, it seemed like the sort of thing Martha would particularly like.

He slept alone that night, as he had for thousands of nights before Martha, but he found he had no taste for it any longer.

_Why did you do this?_ the Doctor thought. _You've never complicated things this way before. Why did you change everything? _

But it seemed so pointless to ask why. He had done it, and here he was. If he'd gotten things wrong with Martha, he'd simply have to make them right.

The next morning when he rose, Martha was already awake and dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, her hair pulled back into a tidy little ponytail. "So, where are we this time?" she said by way of greeting. It might have been her second week aboard.

"Hmm, how best to put this." The Doctor played along, drumming his fingers upon the wall. "You're from 2007. 'Jurassic Park' has already come out, hasn't it?"

"Sure, almost twenty years ago –" Martha's voice trailed off as her face lit up with an enormous smile. "You don't mean. Dinosaurs?"

He rubbed his hands together. "Let's go see, shall we?"

Despite its annoying lack of humans, Earth's Jurassic Period really was a marvel. Ferns the size of willow trees provided cool shade, and trees that dwarfed sequoias reached up into the sky. Martha gasped as a dragonfly buzzed by overhead, longer than a penguin was tall.

When something fuzzy scurried underfoot, the Doctor grasped Martha's elbow to hold her back. "Watch it. Don't want to step on that."

"Is that a vole or a shrew or something?"

"The genus and species aren't around any longer, but in the greater scheme of things, you might call it, oh, 'Uncle Frank.'"

Her eyes went wide. "You mean, that's a human ancestor? That's brilliant!"

"Great oaks, tiny acorns." The Doctor squeezed her arm, hoping she would respond to the gesture and take his hand.

Instead, she stepped away from him to peer toward the distance. "Not a single dinosaur yet."

"If any of the big fellows came around these parts, I doubt so many trees would be standing. Let's try to find the edge of the forest."

"Remember where we parked."

They came to the forest's edge after only a few minutes of walking. A vast grassland of gently rolling hills stretched out in front of them, the best feature of which was the distant herd of apatosauruses on the horizon.

"Oh, my God." Martha held her hand up to shield her eyes from the sun. "They're enormous. They're amazing."

"Want to get closer?"

"I'm not sure." She glanced sideways at him – the first time she'd looked him directly in the eye since Ancient Egypt. "Did you ever actually see 'Jurassic Park'?"

"Yeah, but I'm not sure I got the gist of it. Never buy those pirated copies. The way the image jig-jogs around, you wonder if someone was using the camcorder for juggling practice."

"The point is, the movie made it look like a bad idea for humans to get too close to dinosaurs."

"A wise film indeed. But I'm not talking about getting in their way. Just – closer."

Slowly, Martha nodded. "All right, then."

They started forward, but at that moment, the ground beneath their feet started to shake. "Earthquake?" he said, stumbling as he struggled for balance.

"You really didn't see 'Jurassic Park,' did you?" Martha swatted his arm. "Feel the rhythm? That's not an earthquake, Doctor. It's footsteps. Dinosaur footsteps."

"Can't say I don't show you a good time, Martha Jones."

At that moment, not quite a hundred feet away, a stegosaurus thundered from the forest. Great bone plates studded its back and dwarfed its triangular head. Its long horned tail swished back and forth, as if to ward off predators.

The predators in question turned out to be a dozen medieval samurai.

"Doctor?"

"I see them." Blast it, the paradoxes were still happening! Humans existing millions of years before they ought to have evolved – "Oh, this is bad."

One of the samurai saw them and pointed his sword in their direction. "This prey is ours! You will not steal it!"

Martha muttered, "It just got worse."

"Right." As the samurai gave up their pursuit of the stegosaurus and started toward them, battle flags fluttering ominously, he grabbed Martha's hand. "Run."

They dashed through the primeval forest, darting that way and this, going as fast as they possibly could. An arrow thwacked into a tree only inches from Martha's head, and she yelped.

_Almost there, almost there –_

Just as the samurai were catching up, the TARDIS appeared in front of him, as sure a savior as any the Doctor had ever known. He swung Martha ahead so that she hit the door first and stumbled in to safety. Another arrow struck the side of the TARDIS, vibrating violently, but the Doctor paid that no mind. Wasn't the first time.

He ran after Martha, slammed the door behind him and leapt straight to the controls. The whirring of the TARDIS made him breathe easier as he felt that familiar shiver, the shifting of the time vortex all around them.

For a few moments afterward, nobody spoke. Then Martha turned to him, her palms against the controls and her expression set. "I'm not helping."

"You are."

"The TARDIS isn't getting any better, Doctor! Face facts. I'm not saying it can't be fixed, but I'm not the one to fix it."

How little that seemed to matter at the moment. "I don't want you to go."

Martha simply stared at him, disbelieving. "You only brought me here because of the TARDIS."

"I do love you," he said. "I know that now. Does it matter why I came back for you? As long as I came back?"

"I'm not sure." Martha's head drooped, as if she had been carrying some great weight for too long. "The more I know you – the closer we become – the more I know how much you aren't like me. You're not human. You're beyond human. The things you comprehend and the choices you make – it's past me. I don't think you realize how scary that can be."

"There are things in this galaxy beyond me. I've encountered them."

"Did you love them, too? Because that makes it a hundred times scarier." The TARDIS' shimmering light bathed Martha in green and gold. "We're so different. It seems impossible that you could really love me the same way that I love you."

"Yet here we are."

The Doctor cupped her chin in one hand and kissed her. He meant for it to be tender, but Martha gripped him close, almost convulsively. Then his mouth was open, his hands at her waist and their bodies pressed together but still too far apart.

She led him to his room, not hers. This time he was the one who lay beneath her, the one who let the other lead the way. It took her a while to open up to him – for a long time the sex was only bodies, though that was all right, because he'd almost forgotten how fantastic that could be on its own. When Martha finally closed her eyes and allowed them to flow together, the Doctor didn't look inside her, desperately as he wanted to.

Instead he took her to Gallifrey, where they stood on a hill and looked at the great domed city of the Time Lords glittering on the horizon. Though he knew Martha had not actually been there, he could look to the side and see her, as vivid as the city. Even more so.

Later, as they stretched beside each other in bed, still breathing hard, Martha whispered, "I think this is the first time I've ever believed you were real."

"Yes." He clutched her hand in his so tightly it hurt.

6.

It was a relief when the Doctor finally gave up on the idea that Martha would somehow magically heal the TARDIS simply by being aboard, as though one small element could fix everything. As a physician, she'd never been entirely comfortable with the concept of homeopathy.

And she thought it was a pity that they had to be so worried about the TARDIS all the time, because honestly, most of the paradoxes were rather enjoyable.

"I'd give anything to see Russell Crowe film this!" Martha clapped her hands above her head as they sat in the Colosseum on a blazing summer day in AD 387.

The Doctor cackled with delight. "This is much better than the real thing!"

They sat on stone steps amid a crowd of nearly 50,000 people, all of whom were madly cheering the spectacle in the arena. If you looked closely enough, you could see that some of their eyes were uncertain, but nobody was going to be the first to ask if something wasn't quite right.

Meanwhile, in the heart of the arena, several dozen gladiators were having a vigorous pillow fight.

"Oooh, trident right in the pillowcase!" The Doctor winced as feathers flew into the air. "Thumbs down for that one."

Tears of laughter rolled down Martha's face as she held aloft her mobile phone to get a few snaps. "God, this is brilliant."

"Hey." A burly man in a tunic and leggings, who seemed to be on staff in some capacity, scowled at them. "There are no women allowed in this section."

The Doctor rolled his eyes. "What, the feathers are scattering all around us and you're going to be a stickler for historical accuracy about that?"

"Oh, no!" Martha's smile faded as she saw that the guards were bringing out the next show, which banners proclaimed to be a group of Christians due to be fed to beasts. "I'm not sure I want to see this."

He put his arm around her shoulders and his hand in front of her eyes. When the crowd began to roar again, the Doctor began to chuckle. "Take a peek."

She did. Sure enough, the beasts in question were running forward. The Christians had been thrown upon the mercy of several dozen – pug dogs.

Nobody had given the pugs any historical notes about religious persecution or bread and circuses. As such they appeared to be wholly innocent of their intended role in the proceedings. The little dogs pottered about the arena, panting and snorting, occasionally stopping to scratch or pee or blink at random sections of air they seemed to find worthy of note.

Martha, laughing so hard she couldn't breathe, held on to the Doctor to keep from falling over. Though he was laughing too, he kissed her quickly on the forehead, and the happy glow inside her only became brighter.

_I should write a book. Your Timelord, Your Terms: How to Get Him Exactly That Into You. Of course, I don't have any idea what it was I did, but it's not like you need a lot of credentials in the self-help area to start with._

In the arena, one of the pugs had rolled onto his back, the better to receive a belly rub from a few extremely relieved Christians. "The TARDIS is getting absolutely extravagant," the Doctor said. "It's past time for a full diagnostic."

"And end the fun?"

"Not all the fun." His thumb brushed against the nape of Martha's neck.

**

"So how does a full diagnostic of the TARDIS work?"

"I'll need to check the energy balances," the Doctor said as they walked up a spiral staircase. They were at the top of the ship now. Odd how she'd never come up here before. "See if they've normalized at all."

"I'm surprised you've only now gotten around to doing this."

"Oh, I ran a diagnostic before I ever came back for you." His expression clouded, as if he'd lost his train of thought, but he shook it off. "She was sick then. I'm going to see if she's gotten better."

"How do you do that? I imagine it like checking the oil in a car. Does the TARDIS have a dipstick?"

"I'm the dipstick." He stopped climbing. "That came out wrong."

Martha managed not to laugh at him, but she couldn't help smiling.

They reached the top level and walked toward what looked like a steamy Jacuzzi tub. "What, there's a pool on board and you've been hogging it for yourself? You're in trouble."

"Look again."

As they stepped closer, Martha saw the glow beneath the greenish water and realized what the light was: the TARDIS core, from above. The bottom of the pool was transparent, so that it looked down in the glowing green light of the TARDIS control console itself. "This pool has something to do with how the TARDIS runs, doesn't it?"

"We're linked, you know. Psychically, physically, the works. That's how it always was, before. Each Time Lord grew a TARDIS and bonded with her to be sure she would run true. Well. How it usually was." The Doctor stood at the water's edge, loosening his tie as he kicked off his shoes. "No better diagnostic for her than bonding again."

"So each TARDIS has a kind of – bonding tank?"

"The space changes with each reconfiguration." Draping his jacket over a nearby railing, he added, "Sometimes it's water. Sometimes it's light. For a long time, it was something called the Zero Room. Whatever form it takes, there's always a place within the TARDIS where she and I can merge. Sometimes it's about her figuring out what's wrong with me, but other times, it's about me figuring out what's wrong with her."

"Wow, that's really – remarkable – are you stripping?"

He grinned as he stepped out of his trousers. "Guess I could wear trunks, but modesty seems a bit ridiculous, given how the TARDIS knows me inside and out." Now naked, the Doctor jumped in feet-first. He sank beneath the surface like a stone, so quickly it startled her, but then he came up and shook out his wet hair just like a dog. "Ahh. Feels marvelous."

"It's pleasant for you? Is that a Time Lord thing?"

"At this stage, it's more of a warm tub sort of thing." The Doctor hesitated, clearly weighing an idea. He didn't meet her eyes when he said, very casually, "Why not see for yourself?"

"You're asking me in?"

He didn't say yes or no, didn't look up at her. It was clearly an offer he was only going to make once – and despite his studied nonchalance, the offer was important to him. Martha quickly shimmied out of her clothes, tucked her hair into a makeshift bun and plunged in.

Warm currents swirled around her as she treaded water, her legs pedaling beneath her. Light shone from below, casting odd shadows on the Doctor's face. The liquid was thicker than water, but only slightly, so every ripple caused the gentlest shadow of sensation. Martha imagined she could feel the pulse of energy flowing through. "Wow."

That made the Doctor smile at last. "Amazing, isn't she?"

"The light beneath the console – I've always meant to ask –"

"The Heart of the TARDIS. You must never look at it directly. Never, Martha." His voice was as stern as she'd ever heard it.

"All right, all right, I get it." She brushed her hands along her cheeks. Already her skin was hot with steam. "So, how do we go about checking her out?"

"I get a feel for her, that's all."

The Doctor shut his eyes as he braced his hands against the edge of the tank. His rail-thin body looked like a ripple of broken shadows in the green-gold water. There was something enormously sexy about his face when he was concentrating like that. Martha resisted the urge to run her hands along his back. Instead she kept treading water, enjoying the feel of the currents against her skin.

"Huon/artron balance is still off," the Doctor murmured. "Not as bad as it used to be, though."

"That's good, right?"

"Better than nothing. She's not exactly short on Zeiton-7, but I suppose we could pick up some extra. Restock."

"We're all about side trips."

"It might not fix the problem, but it will help. Perk her up a bit. Yes. That's something, anyway." He opened his eyes and smiled. "That's a relief."

"Always feels better to have something constructive to do." Martha nodded as she slipped her arms around the Doctor's neck. "Don't you think?"

"Absolutely." He considered her, that same odd distant smile on his face, then kissed her. Steam wreathed around them as he opened her mouth with his, and Martha realized for the first time how erotic he found this. She understood why, too.

As one of his hands dipped down to cup her breast, she murmured, "Careful, or we'll wind up having sex right here. Might gum up the works."

"I don't think it would," he said thoughtfully.

"You don't mean – you want to –" He cut off her words with another kiss. Martha wound her legs around him and realized he absolutely wanted to. "God, you're turned on. Is this your idea of a threesome or something?"

He grinned. "Kind of, yeah."

As he kissed his way down the long column of her throat, she whispered, "Isn't it, I don't know, sacrilegious for you? Making love in here?"

The Doctor stopped, and she thought for a moment that she'd stupidly talked him out of it. Then he looked her in the eyes and said, very quietly, "This is what's sacred."

Martha felt almost afraid. "This isn't just about sex, is it?"

"The TARDIS is bonded to me. When you and I –"

"I'll bond to the TARDIS too."

The Doctor nodded.

For the first time, Martha knew, she was the one in danger of shutting herself off and pushing the Doctor away. This was scary. This was like meeting the parents times 10,000. The TARDIS was even more mysterious and powerful than the Doctor – sick, too – what was going to happen?

Only one way to find out, and if she loved him, she had to find out.

Martha kissed the Doctor again, and he understood. With one hand he braced them against the edge of the tank; with the other, he caressed her until she was close to the brink. It didn't take long, not with the currents humming against her skin. When he parted her legs, Martha tilted her head back and held very still as he entered her. Even now, when she'd had him in every position and every mood either of them could imagine, it felt so unreal to her. Almost miraculous. Like a dream.

Then she felt his pleasure, too, intensified by the TARDIS all around them, and gasped.

"Reach in," he breathed against her collarbone. "You know the way. You know."

Martha imagined the Doctor's soul as the core of the TARDIS, glowing and warm and open for her, and she plunged within.

Once again she was on Gallifrey, standing beside the Doctor. He looked so very different – like an old man, but not his own elderly self as he'd been with the Master. No, this was some other gentleman entirely, one with long white hair swept severely back from his face, revealing a widow's peak. Yet he was the Doctor, too, equally as dear to her as her own. He was standing within the TARDIS, gazing up with adoration as he looked at it for the very first time.

"Stolen! You stole the TARDIS," she gasped. "Naughty."

The Doctor's forehead pressed against her temple as they moved, and his voice sounded rough. "Mine."

She was here with him now, there with him then. She was both places and everyplace. Suddenly one of the scenes shifted, a flash of perspective that shocked and delighted her. Martha was looking down at the old Doctor as he looked up at her for that very first time. If only she could have laughed! It was all she lacked in the universe, the ability to laugh. Such joy demanded laughter. Such love demanded joy.

Martha knew it, then – the third presence. She and the Doctor were not alone, not in their own minds. The other presence was even more alien than the Doctor, but not frightening. Never that.

Her eyes flew open. The Doctor's mouth was agape, yet almost a smile. "You feel it? You do!"

"Yes --" Pleasure arced up inside her, and Martha cried out wordlessly, sweeping them – all of them – over the edge.

When she could see again, she was clinging to the side of the tank. The Doctor had sagged against her shoulder, his head nestled in the curve of her neck. Martha wondered if he was the one who'd passed out this time. She felt absurdly proud of herself. Bringing her wet fingers to his cheek, she whispered, "You all right?"

"Never finer." He put one hand on the side of the tank, the same loving caress he'd given Martha moments before. "I imagine she feels better than she has in a while, too."

"The TARDIS isn't so very sick."

Martha hadn't known that she knew that until she said it out loud. The Doctor lifted his head to stare at her. "What?"

How could she put it into words? It was something she'd sensed when she'd been the TARDIS, meeting the Doctor for the first time – something very close to feeling the lack of laughter. "I believe – I believe the TARDIS is making the paradoxes on purpose."

"Can't be." Then the Doctor considered it again, comprehension dawning. "Wait. You mean – she's playing."

"Sometimes, after something really terrible happens, you need to play." Her family had gotten together every night for months after the Year That Wasn't, but after the first few evenings, they hadn't said a word about the Master. Instead they'd played card games – Blitz and Go Fish and Three-Card Stud – or watched silly television shows and talked back to the screen the whole time to make one another laugh. It had been ridiculous, but not really. "I imagine having a Paradox Machine inside you for a year would be pretty terrible. Especially knowing that it was all for the good of the Master, and that the Master was hurting you. I bet that was worse for her than any of the rest."

"Bless." The Doctor looked tenderly downward into the churning liquid glow. "So the paradoxes aren't the sickness. They're how she's healing herself."

Martha smiled. "With hot-pink Vikings, and snow in summertime, and –"

They said the last together: "And penguins."

The Doctor laughed out loud, and Martha mussed his wet hair. Wryly, she said, "Lucky you didn't realize earlier."

"Why is that?"

"You wouldn't have come back for me. Would you?"

"But you were the one who saw it. I was too close. You were who the TARDIS needed." He hesitated, then said, more quietly. "Who I needed."

The Doctor embraced her, and Martha let go of the edge of the pool to hug him back. Together they sank beneath the surface, surrounded entirely by the TARDIS' flow and a swirl of bubbles, and it hardly felt like holding her breath at all.

7.

The truth didn't hit the Doctor until his second glass of bathtub gin.

Splendid place, Chicago, and rarely more splendid than it had been in the 1920s, which were currently living up to their nickname and roaring. He and Martha had found an integrated speakeasy – not the simplest task, but not impossible, either. Breaking the laws of Prohibition made people more willing to ignore all kinds of boundaries.

So they were in a basement that had been transformed into a nightclub, quite possibly the hottest jazz club in Chicago in the '20s, or maybe on any planet, at any time, ever. Martha, bedecked in a white, rhinestone-encrusted dress of fringe, was on the bar with half a dozen other girls, all of them vigorously doing the Charleston.

In the Doctor's admittedly subjective opinion, Martha was the best of the lot.

The saxophones and trombones swayed from side to side on the beat, catching the light as they moved. Cigarette smoke tainted the air, but at least it gave the proceedings a certain hazy glamour. Red walls gleamed wetly of cheap lead paint, and girls in short shiny dresses walked around selling mints from baskets they wore at the waist. The scene was gaudy and rude and so wonderfully human.

_Fine times, _the Doctor thought. _All's right with the world. _

Wait.

He stood up so abruptly that he knocked over his glass of gin. A couple of people stared at him, but most couldn't take their eyes off the dancers. Small wonder, as Martha had just begun a rather delicious version of the shimmy. The feather she wore in her headband jittered with every move.

The Doctor hated to interrupt, but he thought it important. "Martha?" he shouted as he weaved through the crowd toward the bar. "Martha, I need to speak to you!"

She heard him despite the din. Instead of simply hopping down, she made it part of the dance – pointing to her lover, putting her other hand to her cheek and making a face not unlike Betty Boop. The Doctor, realizing how this was supposed to go, held up his arms. Martha jumped down so that he could catch her at the waist, and he grinned as he dipped her backward.

"Show-off," he murmured.

"You're one to talk."

They kissed deeply, and the crowd applauded.

As the band swung into the Black Bottom Stomp, he led her toward the exit. "Is anything wrong?" Martha said. "You look happy, but we're in an awful hurry. What's our paradox this time?"

"That's just it. There isn't one."

She gaped at him as they went out the exit, the bouncer nodding at them as they passed. "You're right. There hasn't been anything! Nothing at all! The TARDIS is well"

He hugged her tightly and wondered if she would let him do the tango with her all the way down the avenue. The full moon and Martha and the entire universe once again his to explore – this was happiness, and it had been absent from his life for too long.

When at last the Doctor let Martha go, he clapped his hands together, eager to make plans. "I believe the TARDIS is ready to get back to work. Thank goodness for that. So, my lady, where to? The ship is yours to command."

Her smile changed – it was still there, but it became softer, almost hesitant. She squeezed his hand. "London. 2007."

"You mean – home."

"I've been studying when I had spare time, but some of my training's getting a bit rusty. I mean, I definitely hope I don't have to intubate anyone tomorrow. Probably make a botch of it if I did."

"Ah. So. You want to stick with the original plan, then. Because, you know, we could take a few trips just to make certain the TARDIS is back in the pink."

"My terms. You said." Martha looked uneasy, but she was standing her ground. "We'll have more adventures. You know we will! But I need to know that we can do this the right way."

The Doctor sighed and started walking beside her. "I keep my promises, Martha Jones."

"So, my next day off – you'll be there?"

"You've got to tell me what it is first."

Her face clouded as she searched her memory. "I think it's October 19."

"Then on October 19, 2007, I shall call for you first thing in the morning. Don't even eat breakfast. I'll have waffles waiting."

"You really will?"

"You know I can."

"It's not the distance," she said softly. "It's the commitment."

He stopped beneath a streetlamp and pulled her close. The white feather from her headband brushed against his temple. "If I'm not there, you're to go straight to Torchwood and tell Jack Harkness that a rescue mission is called for. Nothing less is going to keep me away. All right?"

"All right." Martha kissed him, and he felt the sharp edge of desire for her, cutting deep. He put his arm around her shoulders and guided her back toward the TARDIS. If he had to tell her goodbye for a while, he was going to do it properly, and that would require most of the night.

**

The next morning – around 8 a.m. on that particular day, or six hours after Martha had left her shift with the penguins – the TARDIS reappeared in the hospital car park. Reluctantly, the Doctor opened the door and grimaced at the black clouds and drizzle. "Maybe that stormy weather wasn't a paradox after all."

"What did you say?" Martha came up behind him, already dressed in her familiar jeans and jumper.

"Nothing. Come on, I'll walk you to your car."

He had to turn up the collar of his jacket against the rain, though it didn't keep him from getting wet through. Martha didn't even flinch; instead, there was a definite spring in her step. "It's not that I'm not going to miss you, because I will, terribly. You know that, right? It's just good to be home."

"You want to see your family." The Doctor considered that for a second. He'd regretted not getting to know the Joneses better, or at least under pleasanter circumstances. "Do you think they'd like to come along once?"

"Mum and Dad and Tish? In the TARDIS?"

"They had to endure the Master. Only fair they should see some of the wonder of the universe as well. We could head out deep, show them a supernova. What do you think?"

Her smile illuminated her face. "I think – I think they'd love it."

"Then it's a date."

Martha laughed. There was no mistaking the raindrops on her cheeks for tears. "I'll be counting the days until October 19."

"I won't. I've half a mind to jump straight there." The Doctor grinned.

"You wouldn't. Or would you?" When she turned toward him, she squinted as if blinded by the sun. She had the most amazing smile. He ought to have worked harder to earn that smile from the very first day he met her, but he could make up for lost time. What else was a time machine for? "Whether it's ten seconds for you or ten years, I promise a reunion you won't forget."

"I believe you. If it rained twice as hard as this, I bet I wouldn't feel a drop."

That was rather romantic, wasn't it? But Martha didn't look pleased. She looked confused. "What do you mean?"

He held up his palms, which stung from the droplets driving onto his skin. "This isn't your idea of a rainstorm?"

"But it's sunny. So sunny I'm burning up in this jumper already. Do you really see rain?"

"Yes." He felt a strange uneasiness, a shifting of perspective. A vase, two faces.

"It's another paradox."

"I don't think so," the Doctor said.

"What else could it be?" Martha cast a lovingly reproachful look at the TARDIS. "Not ready for me to go?"

"This isn't like the ones before. We always saw the same paradoxes earlier, but not now. I mean, you're in a completely different day from me. Totally different weather. It's as if – as if we aren't in the same place –"

"What do you mean? Doctor?"

_Oh, no. No, no, no. _

The bonding cure. The need to laugh. Such love demanded joy.

"It's all been a paradox." As soon as he said the words, they were true. Oh, they'd been true before that – true all along – but the Doctor knew it now, and the knowledge fell on him like something cold and foul. "You've been with me, but you haven't been with me. It all happened, but none of it did."

"That can't be right. It can't be." Martha shook her head. "We'll go back to the TARDIS and set it right."

"Doesn't work that way," he said hollowly.

"It has to work that way! You have a time machine! You can always go back and – and undo it. Can't you?"

"No. I can't. Martha, I can't undo what –" The Doctor felt sick. "I can't undo what was never done to start with."

"Don't you do this to me." Tears welled in her eyes, and she took a step toward him – but was a step farther away. "What was that?"

The Doctor stepped toward her, and once again he was a step more distant than he had been before.

Martha frowned in consternation, took another step, then another, until she was running for him with all her might but moving ever deeper into the distance. "Doctor!"

"Martha!" The Doctor ran toward her too. Though he realized it would do no good, that she wouldn't even remember it, he wanted her to have one moment where she could know that he was trying to get to her again. "Martha -- I see you – Martha!"

He broke the surface of the tank, gasping for air. How long had he been under? No telling. The shimmering green-gold glow of the TARDIS was once again bright beneath him. The bonding cure was complete.

Wet, naked and trembling, the Doctor braced himself against the edge of the tank. His discarded blue suit and trainers lay on the floor nearby. He imagined himself in them – the himself he'd been hours or days before when ran the full diagnostic, realized the depth of the TARDIS' illness and made the choice to undertake the bonding cure.

_You took a big gamble with my heart. _

I won.

The TARDIS had needed joy to heal. That wasn't something the Doctor found easy to give her since the Time Wars, and after the Master's Year That Wasn't, it had been impossible. So he had surrendered himself to the trance of the bonding cure, trusting the TARDIS to do what she must in order to heal itself.

He couldn't blame the ship. She'd only done what she had to do. Besides, the right person to blame was himself.

Shakily the Doctor climbed from the tank. He ought to have gone down to his quarters straightaway to sleep; even his Time Lord's body had been taxed to the extreme, and exhaustion sapped him hollow. Instead he lay on his side, listening to the humming of the TARDIS.

_Martha won't remember. At most she'll think she had a dream. _

That ought to have sufficed. Why wasn't it enough?

The Doctor didn't want to know. He pillowed his head on his own shirt and remained still for a very long time.

When at last he rose, he could sense a kind of questioning in the air. Where to? Where to indeed.

For a moment, he considered going to Earth on October 19, 2007, and waiting in a car park for Dr. Martha Jones. Even if she didn't remember, she'd hear him out. But what would he say?

"Levixtian Three, I think." The Doctor curled his shirt around his neck like a spa bather might a towel. "I wouldn't mind visiting another Sky Festival. But let's go to one of the later ones, after they incorporate the hoverdiscs into the dance. That's smashing, isn't it?"

Thinking of it that way removed any sense of wistfulness about the fact that it wouldn't snow.

8.

Martha normally slept in on her days off, but for some reason she woke up bright and early on October 19. Though her stomach was growling even before she opened her eyes, she kept postponing breakfast, though she couldn't think why.

For at least an hour, she sat in her tiny window seat and stared down at the pavement. To her embarrassment, she realized she was wishing for the TARDIS to appear.

_Honestly. It's been eight months. You've thought about him a lot less since Roger. Are you having a relapse? _

She sighed and rested her chin on her knees. Getting on with her life would be simpler if she hadn't had that erotic dream about the Doctor a week ago. Unbelievably erotic, really. The sort of thing no real person could ever live up to. Her subconscious wasn't doing her any favors, that was for sure.

_Sometimes it's worth getting your heart broken, _she reminded herself. _It reminds you that you can still feel. _

The phone rang around 11 a.m. Martha glanced at the caller ID and smiled as she picked up. "Hello, Mum."

"Hello, dear. I know you usually have plans for your free days, but I wondered if you felt like doing a bit of shopping this afternoon. I've got to get a new dress for this work do of your father's."

"I don't think so. Not quite up to shopping today." She sighed. "I wouldn't mind some company, though."

"Are you all right?" Francine sounded worried. Since the Year That Wasn't, she'd become much better about putting others' needs before her own. Sometimes the difference was jarring, but mostly it was nice. "You sound blue."

"Guess I am, sort of."

"Tell you what. Come by the house. We'll have some tea. Play cards. Waste time."

_This,_ Martha reminded herself, _is how we heal. _ "That sounds great."

So she got dressed and headed out the door. Somehow she remained reluctant to leave – it felt as if she were waiting for something that hadn't happened yet. An adventure, perhaps. Maybe it wasn't the Doctor she missed as much as the sense of adventure she'd known when she was with him.

But Martha reminded herself that the adventure was still happening, and would go on every day that she lived.

She smiled as she set out on the journey back home.

 

THE END


End file.
